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Sunday, June 9, 2013

Homages to René Magritte by Cameron Stephen

Son of Man

By The Sea

These are self-portraits of homages to the great Belgian artists René Magritte by Melbourne, Australia based-photographer Cameron Stephen, taken with a Polaroid camera on the unique Polaroid integral film.

"One of the many appeals of the Polaroid camera is it's capacity to give an instant hard copy of the photograph within minutes of the shot being taken. With integral film like the SX-70, 600 and Spectra films for example, watching the image appear before your eyes holds a certain magic, captivating children and adults alike!

Even those knowledgeable in the chemical processes involved in the way these pictures are made cannot help feeling there is something like alchemy happening here. The magic of the peel-apart pack films is another form of alchemy.

On February 8, 2008 Polaroid Corporation announced that it will discontinue production of the instant film that made the company a household name.

I hope that in some way, we can convince Polaroid (owned by The Petters Group) to either change their mind about this regrettable decision, or license the technology to a willing (and visionary) company such as Fuji or Ilford so that this legacy can continue.

I would like to stress that some of the photographic results that can be seen on Polaroid cannot be reproduced by any other camera-film combinations, they are truly unique to Polaroid cameras and film. It would be a real shame to see these art forms disappear completely from the world."